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And I’ll to Bed at Noon Through it all I was all over was and am and could be again. That’s the rub I guess being just being. Being annihilating was and will and leaving only is and does. Take these they will help you take one in the morning and one at night before you sleep even though you don’t sleep can’t sleep I know. That’s the rub. I was awake for three days three days three days waking walking gazing upon a cooler death before stumbling numbly slipping into bed sliding into oblivion. Take these they should help even though they don’t they won’t let me breathe they can’t let me drown my lungs with Carboniferous air oxygen rich and clean just so clean the plants that made it that way formed the coal we can’t stop burning coal we can’t stop choking ourselves with that coal. I’ll take these but they will not help will not let my tongue taste water as it was as it was in Gondwana can not let me smell or see the flowers of those phantom plants they’re gone those plants that grew along every nameless river’s bank gone and nameless like we all will be. No one ever said that life was fair no one ever said but I don’t want fair I’m not asking for fair I just want was and will reconciled with is to hell with be bury it somewhere out of sight trade or give it away. I remember there were days days where I remember certainty in the sunlight like calcium in milk days when I could gaze upon an ocean of time dissecting ripples and swells of a life to come with satisfaction that couldn’t be matched that still can’t be. You see greatness is a myth we purchase when our integrity burns down when all that’s left is but a whisper our memories will fade snuffed out in the end muffled by the distant beats of an unseen drummer keeping time inventing time all the time saying don’t forget the tinder for your pyre cup your hands together gather ashes build a monument to all the gods that failed before you go please don’t forget before you go. It was dry that summer there was so little rain I told her God wasn’t up there wasn’t anywhere else either just wasn’t. That summer she didn’t believe me she couldn’t but she’s married now she’ll find out soon enough but it doesn’t matter if there is a big picture it doesn’t or can’t so I’ll just fold my hands and be that summer I remember that last party it was such a long time since I had smelled charcoal that smell of Calamites teasing me teasing we had it all now behold our noxious second coming that smell filled the tiny patch of grass she called her backyard masked the scent of garbage when it gets hot enough outside the whole city stinks like a landfill it was hot enough outside on that day I remember.
I remember noticing how the houses never looked cheery no matter the weather always dingy and morose the people too I knew even the glinting winter snow white and terrible could not save them. I tried to tell her once tried to get her to come back I told her that her roommates were bitches over coffee I told her that her new boyfriend was a jerk how he had stolen things from the suite at the Flyers game the way he just put them into his backpack looked up laughed smiled and said don’t tell Sarah. I said it is funny I can’t stand your religion but I am probably a better Christian than you and your friends I said hypocrisy I said I said Sarah how can you possibly reconcile the choices you make with what you so strongly profess to believe you see she was very much involved with youth groups and bible studies quick to assert her beliefs with words more often than actions. That last party I remember that last party and how before the party I guess you could call it the pre-party but I didn’t find it very festive we sat but I stood in the living room on the loor around this big guy with long hair and a beard I said to myself that he looked like Santa Claus if Santa Claus was in the Hells Angels and we sat in that circle but I stood Sarah and her roommates and I around this guy who sat in a chair so he was higher off the ground I remember they talked about oh what would Jesus do. Well I just held my tongue and stood a little way off still listening still awfully curious wanting to know to know if I was right about a lot of things now I’m pretty sure I was but then maybe I wasn’t. I remember that guy the guy in the middle up on his chair he was genuinely excited by what he perceived to be impending Armageddon all the girls were excited too he said he wanted to go buy guns turn his house into a fortress protect the whole neighborhood because that’s what Christ should have done should have gone down fighting when Sarah looked back at me to see if I was bathed in passionate glory too I just looked at her for a long time and I kept saying I hate you with my eyes first to her eyes then just endlessly to the back of her head. People kept filing through the kitchen door out and in forth and back they looked like they were lost but there was fiery certitude in their eyes that said no we’re not lost we’re saved so I didn’t ask if they needed directions. Everyone was drinking except me I didn’t drink until my twenty-first birthday can you believe that you probably shouldn’t but it’s true. Sarah’s roommates entertained us with a story about the previous night there was some exclusive party at a well-to-do place they got dressed up went there they got in they actually got in and flirted with guys so they would buy them drinks they didn’t have to pay but they got kind of sick came home and got real sick it was OK though the drinks were free it wasn’t their money they were throwing up and flushing down the toilet while the city slept the sun was baking another hemisphere and I looked at Sarah again to say I hate you but I didn’t I figured it was pointless. The night sky marched on even though I couldn’t see it beneath that horrible tinge those damn refracted city lights my art class in first grade I painted with water colors when I was done the dirty water in my cup would be that color I hated it hated that I made it but that was the only way to keep the brushes clean I wasn’t tall enough to reach the sink. The dark continued creeping Sarah kept introducing me to creepy people I didn’t want to meet wolves in secondhand threads barking that they were sheep and I couldn’t see a point in any of it I couldn’t understand I just sat beneath where stars should have been wondering was it all worthwhile I couldn’t decide I still can't. I remember in the morning I said to Sarah I hope I didn’t accidentally become a member of a cult by attending the party I said I thought they were following in the footsteps of the Manson family or the lunatics in Strong City that I just wanted to make sure I wasn’t on their mailing list or anything like that. I said last night Sarah I wanted to tell you so many things last night I did but the meanings all began to change Sarah there are so many things I know you drank yourself under the table trying to drown me out that’s fine I guess I’m feeling a touch queasy myself now I remember that feeling in my stomach the taste in my mouth repeating the end I remember tasting that ending that taste of an end so well. Now that’s all over was and gone and it seems like ages ago but time is a funny thing now I’m here barred from there and I can’t see anything wrong with me was I wrong weren’t they worse do I really need to take these you said they won’t help not in the way I want them to not in the way I need books have been my medicine how many side effects do you think they have the books I mean I doubt capsules are capable of telling me all that has transpired since the beginning I know that you can’t do that that nothing ever can but that’s okay I don’t blame you like I said I just want was and is and will to coalesce I just want to sleep again I hope that’s not too much to ask is it.
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